Carnegie Unit Once Again

Hopefully, you are following the latest Higher Education News. The government is once again trying to mandate the definition of a credit hour. Inside Higher Education reported on June 16, 2010 that the new proposed definition:

• a credit hour as "one hour of classroom or direct faculty instruction and a minimum of two hours of out of class student work each week for approximately fifteen weeks for one semester or trimester hour of credit," or equivalent amounts of actual instruction for quarters or other time periods.

Why are we back to the archaic method of measuring learning and education by "butt in seat time"? Numerous reports have proven that different delivery formats are actually better or equivalent to creating the learning necessary.

To their benefit, the also included an alternative definition:

• a credit hour "[i]nstitutionally established reasonable equivalencies for the amount of work required in [the previous definition] for the credit hours awarded, including as represented in intended learning outcomes and verified by evidence of student achievement."

Why doesn't the committee look at their own Department of Education report: Evaluation of Evidence-Based Practices in Online Learning: A Meta-Analysis and Review of Online Learning Studies. They reported on page xiv: "Students who took all or part of their class online performed better, on average, than those taking the same course through traditional face-to-face instruction." Face-to-face time with an instructor is not the answer to providing a quality education.

Institutions with online and accelerated programs need to watching carefully this development (that would be practically every higher education institution in the United States). When will we let the professional educators determine learning? Although an alternative definition was given, I am still not convinced the accreditation agencies won't succumb to the pressure and demand that institutions count "butt in seat time" and we will be back to letting the "bean counters" tell professional educators how to really do their jobs.